This is for @trinkisme. After her beautiful art last night I did something I haven’t done in years: wrote something out by hand with pen and paper. I went a different direction than is probably expected, but when the muse speaks, one must listen. I will also post this in my AO3 collection, but right now it has no title.
“I had no right to claim him, I knew it. But in a solitary life, there are rare moments when another soul dips near yours, as stars once a year brush the earth. Such a constellation he was to me.”
Hermione waited, as she did every year, for the summer sky to darken and Antares, the brightest star in the grouping, to appear. The constellation sat so low on the horizon that she could only see the top half of the pattern. But she knew what the whole thing looked like. She had stitched it by hand onto the Malfoy tapestry beside his name.
Scorpius. Scorpius Lucius Malfoy.
When they first started talking about having children, Draco told her if it was a boy – and he was smugly confident their firstborn would be – he wanted his son to be named Scorpius and with the same middle name as he had been given. Any misgivings Hermione had about giving him Lucius’ name had fled when she saw the tears in the senior Malfoy’s eyes upon hearing the news.
Her pregnancy was uneventful. Too easy, Ginny said enviously. She barely gained any excess weight, never had morning sickness or swollen ankles, even though the last weeks were some of the hottest on record. Harry said he hoped his godson would be born on his birthday and when she went into labor at his annual party, laughed and held out a hand to collect a Galleon from Ron. Hermione labored with Molly, Ginny and Fleur at her side while Draco paced the hallway anxiously and Harry teased him about being too pureblood to be in the birthing room. When Ginny finally appeared at the doorway he took two eager steps forward but came up short when he realized the room behind her was silent. Draco shoved past her while the red-haired witch moved into her husband’s embrace.
Hermione was sitting in their bed holding a swaddled bundle. Her face, which should have been radiant, was pale and drawn. She met his gaze and her lips trembled.
“I”m sorry, Draco,” she said. “Molly tried everything.”
HIs body, tiny and perfect, with a downy cap of platinum white hair on his head, was buried with Narcissa. Hermione said she couldn’t bear him to be alone.
Draco’s voice came softly from behind her and she turned to see him approaching with Stella in his arms. Their daughter was born two years to the day after her brother.
Hermione pointed, even though she didn’t need to. Her husband knew the night sky better than she. It was he who had shown her his dragon constellation and then their son’s. Draco sat beside her, settling the sleepy toddler on his lap. She was the image of her mother except that her color of her curls and eyes were his.
“I thought it was time to introduce Stella to her big brother,” he said.
